by Safia Aoude, 2006
Nocturnal House Call
Saida dragged her heavy body out into the kitchen in order to refill the small glass bowl with more sunflower seeds. It was also time to make another cup of Arabic coffee, so she put the tin cup with the long wooden handle on the smallest of the electrical heaters and turned on the stove.
Her husband was sitting on the couch in the living room, watching TV. She and Ahmed had just had a visit from their only son and his new Danish girlfriend, but even though the time was beyond 11 pm, and even though they all had drunk many tiny china cups of Arabic coffee, Saida´s husband had asked for another one. He had been very upset because when Naeim and his Danish girlfriend arrived he´d been expecting them to announce they were going to get married. In stead of Naeim broke the news that the Danish woman was pregnant and that they planned to live happily together without any marriage license because “that´s what people do here”.
Saida had missed the beginning of the latest Syrian TV soap on MBC, but never mind: her son had been there, and it was always such a pleasure to see Naeim again! He was so busy these days, especially now as he had gone in to politics.
Saida herself didn´t understand much politics. Actually, she didn´t understand much beyond brewing coffee, cook nice dinners, sewing and cracking sunflower seeds – oh well, she did know a lot about what went on in the family – who on earth would give five dimes to bother about the Middle East crisis when the family grape vine was loaded with trouble, gossip and news?! Saida fumbled with the collar on her yellow dressing gown; she had used the robe to cover her night dress when Naeim had showed up. Licking her lips, Saida waited for the water in the coffee cup to boil for her to pour tree spoonful of grinded coffee into it. That was the way Ahmed liked his coffee. The sound from the living room TV was audible for Saida to hear the latest news wrap-up from MBC – but suddenly Saida heard something else!
At first it sounded as if her husband was hawking and spitting into the metal garbage can next to the sofa; he did that far too often! But this weird sound didn´t end with the unmistakable sucking sound of throat discharge hitting the plastic bag inside the bin; on the contrary, hubby seemingly kept gurgling and hawking back in the living room.
Her brows arched as they always did when he didn´t do as she wanted him to. How many times hadn´t she asked him not to spew his mucus from the throat and into the garbage can. The bathroom was only a few steps away; then he could flush the goo down the toilet. But no, he simply had to show her who was in charge at home! The worst thing was that sometimes Saida lost something into the garbage can – a nut dropping from between her fingers or a coffee spoon – then she had to use rubber gloves to search for the lost items in order not to – yuck!
The water had start to boil, and just when Saida couldn´t stand listening to those awful sounds from the living room, opening her mouth, ready to shout something to her husband, the sound stopped abruptly. Content, Saida took a serving plate and put the coffee pot with the long wooden handle on it together with two small china cups.
Back in the living room she went that far as to pour the coffee carefully into the small china cups while listening mindfully to the news babble from the TV screen. That´s why Saida didn´t notice her husband before she planted her heavy bones into one of the leather chairs and wanted to pass Ahmed his china cup of Arabic coffee.
Immediately Saida understood that something was very wrong with her husband. His face was almost purple, on the verge of turning blue. His body lay twisted half ways down the sofa, the upper body still lingering on the sofa between the velvet pillows. His left hand was clutched convulsively at his pajamas; the right hand was dangling effortless between his legs. But his face! His facial expression was the worst surprise to Saida: the eyes sallow, almost faint yellow, round as golf balls, on the way out of their sockets, while his mouth was frozen ajar in a grinning grimace of death! Half of his almost bitten off tongue hanging out between the clenched teeth, the teeth themselves surrounded by stretched indigo lips.
The small china coffee cup dropped from her hands onto the glass table, and she hid her face between her hands, screaming: “Ya Allah! Ya Allah! Ya Allah!” – and then she began slapping herself with her flat hands, slap, slap on each cheeks, over and over again, left, right, left, all the time still yelling out to God, asking for mercy, asking for salvage from that terrible sight and the awful situation she suddenly found herself standing in.
Minutes went by, her cheeks burning from the continuous slapping, until the voice of the tenant living in the flat above Saida´s came through the open window: “Shut the hell up, bitch! We wanna sleep!” Quickly Saida ran to the window and closed it tightly. Cool tears ran over her hot cheeks. She remained standing with her back to the closed window, looking at her husband in his strange posture on the sofa behind the TV.
Oh, what was she supposed to do? There was no way she was going to touch him! Then it suddenly hit her: the telephone! She´d better call Naeim and his Danish girlfriend! They had to return and help! Shaking, her fingers pushed the buttons on the phone, failing to hit the correct number sequence twice, and then – finally – managing to get the number of Naeim´s cell phone right on the third try. But the number was apparently busy, or perhaps Naeim had turned off his cell phone and turned on his answering machine. He did that occasionally. Since he had gone into politics in Copenhagen he often turned off his cell phone because of the many threatening and obscene calls he received around the clock. Saida managed to punch in the numbers to Naeim´s home and even the numbers to his office downtown, but both calls went unanswered.
From the corner of her eye Saida peeked at the body of her husband on the sofa. Had he moved? He was probably dead! Ahmed had suffered from diabetes quite a few years, and his heart wasn´t that strong; Saida had always made sure to tell her friends and the family about Ahmed´s condition. That was the reason, after all, why Ahmed had retired years ago and was receiving early retirement welfare. But what was she supposed to do if Naeim didn´t answer his phone?!?
A new thought arrived; slowly but with power! Just recently Saida had watched a non-commercial ad in Danish TV about kids alone at home. They were told to call “hundred and twelve” if anything terrible happened while alone at home. But what did “hundred and twelve” mean? “Hundred” meant 100 – Saida knew that from the price tags at Walmart and other supermarkets. But she never had learned to read and write. ”And twelve” – could that mean...uhm...2? Okay, so it meant 102? And two?
Saida dried her hands absently in her dressing robe; then she slowly and meticulously punched the numbers 1 and 0 and 2. But then she threw down the handle. What was she supposed to say? Her Danish was miserable. “My husband!” – that was what she could utter. Scratching her chin she tried again. 1 and 2, no, 1 and 0 and 2. Then she waited, holding her breath, waiting for anyone to answer at the other end of the line. “Who is this?”, a crisp voice at the other end of the line said. “My husband sick. Coming now, my husband!” “What is it you want?”, the voice asked, a bit more strained this time. “You coming. My husband sick. Doctor!” Saida did not get what the voice at the other end of the line was saying this time. While she was making the call she kept glaring towards her husband on the sofa; on the bitten off tip of his tongue protruding from his clenched teeth, hanging from his mouth like a tiny bit of fleshy appetizer, dried but not yet browned blood streaks across his chin, blood streaks running all the way down from the chin onto his pajama, soaking up the streaks before they could proceed further downwards.
She kept babbling: “My husband sick. Coming now. Doctor!” in similar ways with different intonation, until she thought the voice at the other end gave in and – probably – said to her, too: “Sick husband. Coming now. Doctor!”, at least that is what Saida thought she heard, and soon after she heard a click and the line went dead; the other end had hung up.
There she stood at the little telephone table, the receiver in her hand, realizing that Ahmed must have had helped himself to another handful of sun flower seeds. It wasn´t until now that Saida had noticed the shells scattered on the sofa, on the table, on the carpet, just outside the bowl. He probably had swallowed some of them into his windpipe in stead of his gullet. Saida could smell urine. Maybe Ahmed had released himself while fighting death, on the expensive new, blue leather sofa? She couldn´t see any dark stains; but then again, Ahmed was half sitting on some of the velvet pillows – they soaked well if need be. Again she tried to call her son on the phone, in vain. There was no answer.
Some minutes went by, maybe some more. MBC had finished the news and the speaker announced the evening concert with the Iraqi tenor Kazem Saher. Saida had been looking forward to that concert all week, but she wasn´t really listening to anything on the screen right now. She sat down in one of the leather chairs, thinking what to do, watching Kazem Saher dressed in a black silk shirt and wearing a white cotton tie gripping the mike and twinkling to his female fans from the scene. He began singing, and Saida watched not really seeing anything, but her eyes glued to the screen in front of her. Was he really dead? What had happened. And what was she supposed to do now?
And then the door bell rang! Twice!
Saida winced as the sound from the electric buzzer hit her nerves, but then she rose from her chair, sniffling, wiping her check clean with the sleeve of her gown and tightening the rope around the waist. Finally she opened the door.
A somehow old man was standing in the entrance. She hadn´t seen him before. He seemed rather aged with his wrinkled face, the thin glasses, the sparsely, grey beard around his cheeks and chin. He wasn´t very tall, at least not taller than Saida herself. The man was staring at Saida over the top of his thin glasses and said very politely: “I am the doctor you have called for. Could I please come in?” He was dressed in a dark, cheap suit, wearing a better tie, carrying a small brown bag in his left hand. Abruptly Saida threw open the door, shrieking: “My husband! My husband sick! Oh God!”. The short, old man recoiled slightly at the pitch of Saida´s voice, immediately gathering himself into rigid posture again, quickly smiling assuring, but with a serious smirk at the corner of his thin lips.
”Let me in to get a look at him.”, he quacked. His voice matched his croaked statue and the wrinkles in his triangle face. “You just relax and take it easy.”, he told Saida and pushed her gently out of the way as he entered the living room. Saida sucked in more air in preparation of another wailing, but then she changed her mind and kept quiet. The doctor should work in silence, she understood.
”Oh my, that is bad.”, he said solemnly. “That is quite bad…” Behind him Saida at once started slapping her cheeks left and right to answer the hopelessness of the man´s words she didn´t understand but whose meaning was quite clear to her anyway.
The man put his bag down onto the floor and reached for Ahmed´s arm to measure the pulse. He glanced at his watch while his thin lips moved soundlessly. Then he let go of the arm, turned towards Saida and shook his head.
Straight away Saida resumed the slapping. She wailed out loud, again and again calling out to God, drowning out the voice of Kazem Saher, drowning out the feeble voice of the doctor trying to calm her down. Fresh tears ran down her hot cheeks once again, this time the tears kept coming, making her flabby face wet and sticky. Saida fell down into one of the chairs, tearing at her head dress, then, as the head dress was torn of, hair graying hairs, hitting herself on the chest, repeatedly, in agony and despair.
Next to the stiff body of Ahmed, on the sofa close to the chair where Saida was raving along, sat the short man with the thin glasses, waiting patiently for Saida to loose her strength and stop. The wrinkles in his face showed sorrow, and his old brown eyes felt with the grieving woman next to him. Eventually Saida slipped down from her chair onto the carpet, sobbing, gasping deeply for breath, her hands glued to both of her chins. “My husband!”
From that moment on and until 1 am Saida did not remember anything else. She woke up from her swoon, as the old man gently patted her hand, tugging at her sleeve. “You know what, little missus, why don´t You go into the kitchen and make a good cup of coffee for Yourself – and perhaps a cup for me, too. I´ll try and see what I can do here.” Saida understood the word “coffee” but she didn´t reply with anything else than a short moan and the words: “My husband!”
”Go on! Make that coffee. Yes, coffee! You´re husband´ll be alright...” Saida glanced towards the sofa from where the body (?) of her husband had been removed. Now Ahmed was lying with his feet under a wool blanket. The short doctor must have fetched the blanket from the bedroom. Ahmed´s mouth was closed now; his eyes as well. On the carpet next to the sofa Saida spotted some bits of cut bandage. The garbage bin was filled with blood soaked pieces of bandage. Some shredded threads and a pair of pink rubber gloves were lying on the sofa table. “Coffee´ll make a difference”, the old doctor croaked again, waiting for Saida to move.
She understood. Insecurely she rose from the floor and gathered herself a short moment before slowly dragging her feet and her body to the kitchen. She would get the Danish coffee machine and fill it up with coffee, using the paper filter and using the packet of Danish Gevalia coffee she only used for special occasions. Soon the reassuring sound of the bubbling coffee machine made Saida relax a bit. Relaxing like in a death trance. Wasn´t her husband dead, after all? She remembered how the doctor had shook his head. How blue the lips had been. How the tongue tip had trailed on the last piece of…..bleeding….
But maybe he hadn´t meant her husband was actually dead when he had shook his head. Those Danish people; always behaving so strange! And now Ahmed was lying with a blanket covering his body. If he was dead, surely the doctor would have covered up his head, too, wouldn´t he? That´s what you did with dead people, covering up their head!
Skillfully Saida poured the black water into two large cups and placed the cups onto two matching saucers on the same plate she had used just hours ago to place the two small china cups on to. Then she breathed heavily, mumbled a short prayer she had learned from her mother-in-law years ago, and then she carried the tray into the living room.
The doctor was packing his gear as she arrived with the tray. He was brushing something off his brown bag. Saida put the tray down onto the table, stealing a quick glance at Ahmed´s rigid body under the blanket. The color of his face wasn´t purple anymore, as she had thought it was earlier. In fact, he looked like he was only sleeping.
The little doctor reached for his cup of steaming coffee and smiled, encouraging Saida with a friendly nod. “That didn´t turn out so bad.”, he said. Saida grimaced a wrong smile, but remained standing. “My husband?”, she asked. The doctor swallowed his brew with a tight slurping sound and put down the cup on the saucer. “It´ll be alright.” “Go now?” “Yes, I better go now.” Saida wanted to ask him when the ambulance would be here, but she failed to find the Danish words. The doctor rose and gave her his hand to shake. Normally Saida wouldn´t touch the hand of a strange man, but this time she grabbed his outstretched hand with both of her hands, engulfing the thing fingers in her fleshy embrace, shaking the doctor´s hand up and down, wailing again, tears running anew, this time called by gratitude and relief. She gibbered on in Syrian Arabic and did not see the doctor retiring shyly from her outburst before the escalating would begin. He looked uneasy, as if he had been on the brink of going out for a stroll without an umbrella and found the sky dripping.
When Saida closed the door behind him, her hands were shaking. It all felt so unreal! That chunk of flesh, the blood, the indigo head, the ball-shaped bridle eyes, stiffened in agony and fear. Maybe she had been exaggerating a bit? She had passed out, hadn´t she? Her sister Malika was of an equivalent hysterical nature, and Malika often saw strange things, spirits and things. That could be hereditary. But she should get a better look at Ahmed now – maybe not right now, but soon.
Kazem Saher had stopped singing long time ago, and MBC was showing a rerun of an interview with some minister from some Arabic country; his hand was pounding up and down and he was shouting rather than talking. Saida took the remote control and shut the TV off, changing her mind, turning it on again. Avoiding the body on the sofa opposite of her, she tried to call Naeim on the phone once more. Answering machine.
Saida´s husband was still lying on the sofa, bristling toes on top of a velvet pillow at the other end of the sofa. His eyes were still shut, just as his mouth below the big, black moustache. Saida watched his body under the blanket. Was he breathing? Didn´t the blanket move just a tiny bit, up and now down again? Just a little, hardly noticeable. Should she try to call Naeim again?
The brown, saucy fingers of Saida (well, Ahmed used to call her fingers brown sausages when he was in the mood for lovin´) reached out for the remote control on the table. From the corner of her eyes she felt something was moving. The blanket! There – a quick shift, and now! Another one! Saida rose from her chair, standing with large eyes gazing at the blanket on top of Ahmed´s body. The blanket was moving, alright, slowly, step by step, towards the brink of the cushion and to the floor below the sofa. Another few moves and it would slip nicely off.
Then Ahmed´s body moved, too!
His upper torso twisted upright, as if he was sitting on the order of some army sergeant, rigidly, jerking the limbs into place. Saida heard the bones groan in their sockets. His dried lips, half of them sewn together in large, uneven stings, parted slowly to exhale a gargling message of re-encounter to his beloved wife. She, however, was quite unable to listen to any words. She was already lying unconscious on the carpet in front of the running TV set.
Later, much later, and only as a small notion without pictures in the middle pages of the local newspapers, persistent readers received news about how the father of Denmark´s most well known immigrant politician had suffered a severe heart attack and died. And how the grieving wife had been committed into a hospital with no handles on the inside of the patient rooms. What the news item didn´t write, however, was the gossip behind that news. The local paper was a decent paper and the editor did not want to endanger the promising career of young Naeim – yet. That´s why there was written nothing about what people told each other at the many immigrant women clubs in town; how the mother of Naeim had been hospitalized in the psychiatric ward, because she had been sewing together her dead husband. The woman had done other terrible things, too, such as ripped off her hejab and everybody was wondering why she had suddenly turned from sewing cushions and dresses to knitting large blankets. After all, no one in the community wanted to ruin the chances of Naeim getting elected into Parliament…so the gossips remained gossips. For now.